Fall Special - PG Fiber2Art on Etsy!

Are you ready to do some printing?  Maybe work on some fall projects or something for the upcoming holidays? Now's the time to Fall into Printing with PG Fiber2Art!  Starting today, Oct. 1, for the month of October, I am running a special in the Etsy shop.  Buy any 2 screens, and you will get a 3rd small screen FREE!  In order to use the special, you will need to select your 3 screens and add them to your cart.  Use the coupon code OCTOBER at check out, and the $4.00 cost of the free small screen will be deducted from your total.  There are 12 small screens in the shop to choose from.  The other 2 screens can be any size screen of your choice, including custom screens.  As noted in Friday's post, 5 new screens were added to the shop last week.

And here's our new shop banner - isn't it cool?  Those are screen printed hand-dyed scarves in the background.

If you are in the Washington, DC/ Northern VA/ Maryland area and want to learn more about thermofax screen printing, Elizabeth & I will be teaching our Printing with Thermofax Screens class at Artistic Artifacts on Oct. 19, from 10 AM to 3:30 PM.  Join us to get some hands-on practice with printing under the guidance of experienced teachers.   You also will have plenty of time to print your own fabric - create small pieces or print yardage, or both!  The choice is yours.  We have lots of screens for you to use, more than are available in the Etsy shop.  Additionally, in November we will be teaching Turn Your Photos into Thermofax Screens, which teaches you to use Photoshop to turn your own original photos into black and white images that can be made into screens.  Make your quilts and art truly your own by using your own images.  Hope to see you soon!  Below are some pics from our class last spring.  Oh, and don't forget to like our page on Facebook!

Quilt Documentation at Virginia Historical Society

I spent Saturday in Richmond, VA at the Virginia Historical Society to help with a quilt documentation day, co-sponsored by the Virginia Consortium of Quilters and the Virginia Quilt Museum.  We are hosting documentation days around the state to gather information about quilts and their makers in the state of Virginia, and to build a database of that information which will be housed at the museum and available for future research on textile history, genealogy and material culture.

It was a very busy day!  Documentation began at 10 AM; it was scheduled to end at 4 PM, but people were still patiently waiting with their quilts so it was 6:00 by the time we finished.  I spent the first part of the day helping with photography - that was a great job because I got to see every quilt during that part of the day.

 

I didn't get to take many pictures, though, because the day was so busy.  Quilts ranged from pre-Civil War to late 20th century.  Quilt owners could bring up to 3 quilts.  These pictures show the documentation teams at work and the owners patiently waiting for their turn.

I spent the afternoon learning to look carefully at a quilt to document its fabrics, patterns, methods of construction, time period, batting, backing, quilting, and anything else you might think of to identify.  It was quite an educational and fascinating process!  And many of the quilts were spectacular, despite the effects of time and wear on the fabrics.

Above is one I helped document, notable for its "cheddar" yellow fabric that is typically 1850's time period.  I took 3 family quilts along to document, but didn't get a chance to do them.  There will be more dates in October, November, January and February.  I'll share some pictures in another post.  All in all, a tiring but very worthwhile day.

 

New Screens in PG Fiber2Art Etsy shop

Five new thermofax screens were recently added to the Etsy shop; 2 are flower sets which give you the same flower in 3 different sizes, the other 3 are graphic designs.  Here's one of the flower sets, and what it looks like printed:

 

This is called Autumn Mum, converted to a screen image from a photograph; the flowers are 3", 4" and 6".  Cool, huh?

One of the graphic designs is "ricing" elongated shapes that resemble grains of rice.  This design was hand drawn and then digitized.  Here it was used on a scarf in 3 different colors of paint and discharge product.

Head on over to the shop and check out these and the other designs.  If you haven't tried screen printing, Elizabeth & I will be teaching a thermofax printing class Oct. 19 at Artistic Artifacts in Alexandria. You can read all about it and register here.

Sacred Threads Quilts 2013

Back in July I was fortunate to visit a quilt exhibit held locally but with participants from all over the US.  Held every 2 years, the Sacred Threads exhibit features art quilts that seek to touch the viewer on a spiritual and personal level.   Quilts fit the themes of joy, spirituality, inspiration, grief, healing and peace/brotherhood.  The maze-like layout of the show with music quietly playing in the background make it easy to lose yourself in the spirituality, beauty and excellence of the quilts.  Here are a few of my favorites - just a very small sampling of the amazing work by incredible quilt artists.

Seneca Rocks and Blackwater Falls

Wow, I can't believe I actually have not posted since I came home from New Hampshire!   I have been a little busy, finishing up my last month of work before retirement, preparing for the VCQ meeting last weekend, and going on a few motorcycle rides with my husband.   Soon I'll be able to fit more consistent posts into the schedule - 10 more working days to go! In the meantime, here are a few pictures from our ride to West Virginia this weekend.

 Riding out 211 through Virginia on the way to cross the Blue Ridge.  We rode west past Luray to 340 south, took that to 33 west through Harrisonburg, and across the Alleghenies into West Virginia.

 The Alleghenies are some BIG mountains.  Beautiful scenery, some of the roads a little scary but I made it.  Of course, I'm riding on the back, not driving, so I can choose not to look if I want!  Above and below are taken at a roadside overlook of the Germany Valley along 33 in WVA.

 We followed Route 33 to Seneca Rocks and further on our way to Blackwater Falls State Park.

 Below is Seneca Rocks.

 We rode through the Canaan Valley to get to Blackwater Falls.  It's kind of funny to think of it as a valley - its really a high plateau - but I guess when you consider the mountains around it, its still a valley.

 Only 1 of our group went all the way down to the lowest viewing platform.

 Here's the group - minus me, of course.

Then we road along the crest of Mt. Storm, circling back around to spend the night in Moorefield. We were lucky enough to have good weather Saturday, it was really cool for August.  Of course the rain came overnight and we rode all the way back in rain, but fortunately the route back was much shorter and the rain steady but not drenching.  Rain suits kept us mostly dry.

Leaving Quilt Camp 5

Time to head home tomorrow - wrapping up quilt camp for another year.  Here's a selection of photos - more specific posts will follow after I get home!
 

 

My supplies are packed and work table is mostly cleared off;  above is a shot of 3 weeks worth of dyed & printed fabric, shirts and scarves.  Yummy colors!

 

We made lots of scarves, mostly dyed and printed with thermofax screens.  Above are some examples.

 I tried batik again, armed with the knowledge gained from an April class in Indonesian batik.  Very pleased with the piece on the left.  The right photo is a print from a thermofax screen that I drew.  Happy with that too.

 

We watched lots of Quilting Arts DVDs, one was Fusible Art Quilts with Frieda Anderson and  Laura Wasilowski - this is my attempt at a fusible art quilt a la Frieda Anderson.  Press on!

Finally, a shot of one of Barbara's day lilies, and a pretty sunset - not our last night since it was a rainy day, but one of the best of camp.  

Ice Dyeing Tutorial

In the past when I've ice dyed, I made a "parfait" of layered fabrics/shirts/scarves in a container with ice and powdered dye between each layer.  That method works fine, but whatever is on the bottom gets the darkest and greatest mix of color.  For a little bit more control, I've adapted another method, similar to the process I've used with snow.  (For that, I've used a plastic mesh tacked to a wooden stretcher strip frame over a plastic kitty litter pan.)

I found that a mesh grapefruit bag stretches to perfectly fit an 11 x 15 inch kitty litter pan, like a sleeve.

I just stretch out the mesh bag (both ends are cut off) and slide the pan inside. Securing at opposite ends with clothespins (binder clips would work too) pulls it taught enough to hold the weight of the fabric and ice.  The piece of fabric in the bottom of the pan is ready to catch the drips.

Layer your soda-ash soaked fabric or garment (about 1/2 cup soda ash per gallon of water, available from ProChem and Dharma Trading Co.) on top of the mesh, layer with ice cubes or crushed ice, and then sprinkle your dye powder on top.  Be sure to wear rubber gloves and a protective mask when handling dye; I use MX Procion fiber reactive dyes (available from the 2 sources mentioned above, or a local art supply store such as Artistic Artifacts in Alexandria, VA).  With this method, you can still layer 2 items on top of each other, or place them side by side.  I like to scrunch my fabric to get a mottled pattern.  Depending on the size of the items, you might be able to do more.

 The 2 photos above show a shirt and scarf placed on the pan, then the ice and dye on top.  The ice should completely cover the items you are dyeing.  The more ice you use, the more it will dilute the colors.  For this project, I wanted, soft, mottled colors.  I used yellow, coral, and turkey red.  Start with your lighter colors first or they won't show up in the finished product.

 Here you see the ice melting into the pan below; as it does so, the colors seep into the fabric.  The ice causes some of the colors that make up the dyes to separate and form interesting patterns.  When you do this process by the parfait method, whatever item is on the bottom would be sitting in all the liquid, so it will be darker and more solid than pieces on the top.

This is the t-shirt spread out a bit after the ice has melted and it continues to "batch".  I let things set at least 24 hours before rinsing out.  Rinse in cool water till the water runs almost clear, then hang to dry.  After drying (they don't have to be completely dry), wash your items in  hot water with Synthrapol (to remove excess dye).  I also like to throw in a color catcher to pick up excess dye - they turn beautiful colors and are great to use in mixed media or collage projects, and are especially good for screen printing or block printing.

Here are the 3 items from this dye session hanging to dry - t-shirt, fat quarter that was in the pan to soak up the dripping dye, and a bamboo rayon scarf.  I am happy with how these colors turned out - it's always a bit of a surprise, but that's the fun of it!